


STAR-CROSSED: A Very Sad Love Story

by transdimensional_void



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF), The Sims (Video Games)
Genre: Alcohol, Angst, Cheating, Crack, F/M, M/M, Multi, The Sims
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-21
Updated: 2014-12-26
Packaged: 2018-03-29 19:59:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3908695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/transdimensional_void/pseuds/transdimensional_void
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dil and Eliza share a FORBIDDEN LOVE</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“No, Dil, we mustn’t,” Eliza whispered, turning away from him and covering her face with her hands. Dil thought he could hear tears in her voice. When he’d called her in the middle of the night, he’d expected her to hang up on him once again. Yet here she was, meeting him in a dark corner of the park at nearly 1:00 in the morning.

 

“But, Eliza…” he murmured, stretching a hand out toward her shoulder and then dropping it. What right did he have to touch that perfect, pink lycra-clad shoulder? None. None at all. She was a married woman. She could never be his, and yet… “I’ve never felt the kind of spark with anyone that I did with you the other night at the gym. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you since.”

He saw a shudder pass through her at his words. She gave a few sniffles then let her hands fall from her face. Her lovely eyes were bright with tears.

“I feel the same way, Dil. You’ve been the only thing on my mind since that fateful night, or actually early morning.”

Dil nodded vigorously.

“Yes, it was technically early morning, wasn’t it?”

“It was,” she agreed, tears welling up from her eyes to spill down her cheeks once more. “Oh, Dil. If only I weren’t already married.”

“You should leave him, Eliza!” Dil exclaimed, reaching a hand out toward her again and this time, encouraged by something he saw in her eyes, boldly clasping one of her hands. “Didn’t you tell me that he yells at you for staying at the gym until 3 AM? And didn’t you say that he always makes terrible, breakfast food-related jokes about your name?”

Her beautiful face scrunched up as her crying intensified, and she let out a little wail.

“This morning he told me my outfit made me look more over-easy than Grand Slam special,” she sobbed, the sound so pitiful Dil thought his heart might break. Throwing all caution to the wind, he threw both arms around her and drew her toward his chest in a tight embrace. The feel of her body pressed against his made him suddenly feel warm all over.

“Eliza, look at me,” he whispered to her. When she didn’t respond for a few moments, he placed a hand under her chin and gently tilted her face back to allow him to stare deeply into her beautiful Sim-green eyes. “Marriage is nothing but a piece of paper, if it’s an unhappy one.”

“Oh, Dil,” she sighed. Emboldened by the softness of her expression, Dil bent forward, closing his eyes, lips puckered and ready…

But they only met with air. At the last moment, Eliza had pulled away. Startled, Dil opened his eyes, only to see her backing away, slowly at first, and then with more resolution.

“Eliza…” he said, his voice dripping with anguish. Every step she took away from him seemed to be ripping a little piece of his heart away with her.

Her lips moved, forming the words “I’m sorry,” and then she spun on her heel and dashed away, disappearing into the night.

Dil was left staring after her, shoulders slumped, arms empty, and heart as black as the void in the street near his house.

“Eliza…” he murmured, but there was no one to hear him but the llama hedge.

THE END… Or is it???? 


	2. The Llama Hedge Assists

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dil gets help for his Eliza problems from an unexpected source.

The next day, Dil bought a llama hedge.

 

He couldn’t say exactly what perverse impulse had prompted him to purchase it — this bushy reminder of the lowest moment of his life so far. Every time he looked at it, in place of the llama’s dark, leafy face he saw Eliza’s pale one, cheeks glistening with tears under the light of the park’s lamp posts, soft lips shaping her parting words, “I’m sorry.” And then she would vanish, leaving him reaching out yearningly toward a bush.

Frankly, it was embarrassing. Was it any surprise, then, that that evening found him three zebra fizzes gone and slumped over in his front garden at the llama’s twiggy feet? 

He’d only been planning to practice mixing one drink, but somehow the one had turned into another and another, and after a while the vague, warm glow surrounding him had become a sort of horrible numbness. Nothing really felt like anything anymore, even the thoughts of his darling Eliza, so he’d wandered out to the front of his house to see if perhaps the dreaded llama hedge could bring sensation back to him. But alas! When he looked, he saw nothing but a conglomeration of plant parts molded roughly into the shape of a South American camelid.

“Oh, llama, you’re my only friend,” he muttered now into the dirt near the llama’s front left foot. This wasn’t exactly truthful. After all, his phone was full of names of people who had gladly chatted with him in the street, or at the bar, or in the gym. In a calmer, more sober moment he may have been capable of acknowledging that fact. But lying in the dirt as he was now, there was something far more satisfying about wallowing in the misery of having no one but a plant to hear his woes. “And you’re the only one who cares about me,” he added for good measure. Ah, how delightfully low he felt.

“Disgusting!” he heard a voice exclaim

“I know,” he mumbled into the dirt. “That’s probably why Eliza doesn’t love me.”

“Ugh. Do you even hear yourself, you whiny little toenail clipping?  _Oh, Eliza doesn’t love me! Oh, my life is over!_ Try being ripped from your home and transplanted into some lovelorn boy-Sim’s front garden. How’s that for life-ruining?”

Dil frowned and then rolled over just enough that he wasn’t tasting soil anymore.

“I don’t think I appreciate your tone very much, you…” Dil’s frown deepened. He lifted his face from the ground and rolled his eyes around in their sockets, trying to get a fix on just who had wandered up his path and started insulting him. There was no one there. “You… Where are you?”

“I’m right here, you wilted cabbage.” 

Whoever it was, they were very close by…and sounded rather cross. Dil turned toward the voice, gathering all his powers of concentration in an attempt to focus his eyesight on the speaker — but the danged llama hedge’s legs were in the way.

“Stupid llama hedge,” he growled, curling his lip.

“Well, I  _never_. I suppose you think you’re some kind of genius yourself, then? Don’t you now, you crusty pancake?”

At that, Dil let out a tiny, thin wail.

“Pancakes!” he cried. “Why did you have to say that word?”

His unknown interlocutor let out a long-suffering sigh. Had Dil been more himself he would have heard the hint of pity hidden within the exasperated sound.

“Look, you,” said the voice. “I may just be a bush, but I’m not completely ignorant of the ways of love. Did Eliza  _say_ that she didn’t love you?”

Dil blinked rapidly a few times and made a vague motion with his hand. He’d planned on scratching his head, but somehow that felt like too much effort at the moment, so he settled for just raising his hand a few centimeters from the ground before dropping it back down at his side. This stranger, whoever they were, did seem to have a point.

“Well, no…” He drew the ‘o’ out to make it clear that he required further convincing.

“What  _did_  she say then?”

Her face swam up before his eyes again. Her lips moved, pulled thin, then rounded, then pulled thin again, forming the words once more before his mind’s eye.

“She said, ‘I’m sorry,’” he mumbled. Then he creased his brow, a sudden thought occurring to him. “Sorry for what, though?” She’d apologized to him…for not kissing him. That’s how it had happened, right? But why would she be sorry for that, unless…

Dil sat bolt upright and then immediately regretted it. His brain gave a sickening lurch inside his skull, and his stomach felt positively stormy. But he pushed those things aside for a moment.

“She  _does_ have feelings for me!” he exclaimed.

“Ding! Ding! Ding! We have a winner!” If Dil hadn’t been so distracted by his wondrous new discovery, he may have noticed the way the stranger’s voice dripped with sarcasm.

“I’m going to give her a call right now!”

“At midnight?” the stranger snorted, a breathy — almost horse-like? — sound.

“No, you’re right,” Dil’s hand paused, hovering above the pocket that held his phone. Calling Eliza in the middle of the night was hit-or-miss at best. Better wait until morning.

With a few curses and an assist from the llama hedge — and did he hear some muffled grunts as he braced himself on its neck? — Dil managed to regain an upright posture. He cast one final look around the garden, but there was still no one there. Had the stranger run off, their need to insult him satisfied at last? He shook his head and gave up worrying about it. His head felt far too bad to spend much time thinking about anything.

“Thank you, whoever you were,” he mumbled into the night, waving a limp hand behind him.

“Yeah. Great. Any time,” came the voice from behind him one final time, but Dil was so busy trying to figure out the handle on his front door that he didn’t even hear it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally posted on tumblr in celebration of the five days of Dilmas.


	3. Dear Eliza

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dil has a lot to apologize for today...

Dear Eliza,

I hope that you are reading this and that you didn’t just immediately delete it as soon as you saw the name “Dil Howlter” in your inbox. I hope that you haven’t come to hate even the sight of my name.

All I can say about what happened today is that everything is my fault. I know how strange you must have felt when I showed up at your door uninvited and then just marched up the stairs to find you. Thank you for being so gracious as to welcome me anyway, and to even go so far as to give me a friendly hip bump in your bedroom. And, by the way, may I just say you have a lovely home? I think I forgot to mention that in my excitement at seeing you again.

I must apologize for what I said… I should have known better. You told me how you felt about breakfast food puns. I know I crossed a line when I said that you looked so good I wanted to pour syrup all over you and eat you right up. But I hope you understand that you really did look positively delicious today — and every day.

And I also must apologize for how I treated Bob. I tried so hard, Eliza. Really, I did. We did manage to have a very pleasant conversation about our garbage sorting techniques and how to make money from a package delivery service. Things were going so well — I even considered asking him his views on open marriage. But then, just imagining having to share you with him, I was overcome by a sudden, inexplicable attack of jealousy. I hated him, Eliza. All at once, for no reason at all, I hated him. I… well I don’t quite know what came over me after that. I know I insulted his gardening abilities…and that I also came onto him at one point. I’m sorry. You must think me half-deranged. (He is a very handsome man, though. If you wouldn’t mind passing on my phone number to him — Well, no. It’s probably better that you don’t, now that I think of it. I’ll give it to him myself.)

You are too good to me, Eliza. I still can’t quite believe that you agreed to come to the park with me again — one last time. I had so hoped it would be just the two of us, as it was before, that night when I held you in my arms… No, I suppose it’s wrong to remind you of that now. You made your feelings very clear to me this afternoon.

I hope you can find it in your heart to forgive me for my behavior today. There’s no excuse for any of it. Please tell me that, at the very least, we can still be workout buddies?

Your Very Ashamed Friend,

Dil Howlter

PS - Did Bob happen to mention anything about me to you? You know, later on after I left? Just curious! xoxo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally posted on tumblr in celebration of the five days of Dilmas.


	4. The (exciting) CONCLUSION???

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dil is haunted by the three ghosts of his past...

When Dil checked his e-mail the next day, there was no response from Eliza. His first reaction was disappointment, followed quickly by relief, but after a few minutes these had both been replaced by a vague sense of impending doom. Surely she’d seen his e-mail by now, yet she was taking her time in replying. That  _couldn’t_ be a good sign.

He couldn’t stop worrying about it all morning, and he ended up paying for his distraction when he nearly lost a finger chopping up some vegetables for a quick salad. He knew he needed to do something to take his mind off of it all. A trip to the gym, perhaps? But thinking of the gym just reminded him of Eliza. No, the gym wasn’t it. The bar, maybe… But it was barely 11:00 in the morning. Did he really want to be the sort of person who hung around bars in the middle of the day? No. He wasn’t going to let this thing with Eliza drag him down that far. 

A thought popped into his mind then — just a shred of remembered conversation. Hadn’t someone told him there was a new exhibit at the art museum? That was it! A trip to the museum was just what he needed to get himself out of his depressingly empty house and possibly even gain some culture in the process.

His hopeful mood was dampened somewhat when he arrived at the museum and saw how bare a place it was. He’d been envisioning an old building with an air of history, perhaps a little dusty, and generally overflowing with cultural artifacts. But this place had been designed with a sleek, modern aesthetic — large, bare white walls that dwarfed the tiny, framed works hung just a little too far apart, and dramatic lighting that spotlighted a single sculpture here, or a single painting there. 

Overall, the place left him cold, but he tried to shrug it off. He let his eyes wander over the first gallery, hoping they would catch on some object of interest. After they’d made a single circuit of the room, the most interesting thing he had found was a small sculpture of a dog next to a wall on his right hand side. He shambled up to it, inspecting the creature’s roughly formed tail, its tiny bronze paws, its eerily hollowed-out eyes. He’d hoped something as homely and down-to-earth as a dog would lessen the intimidating feel of the room, but alas this dog was just as cold as everything else in this soulless place.

Maybe coming here hadn’t been such a great idea after all…

Then he heard a sound that sent a shiver down his spine — the chilling voice of Erica Pendleton. And that’s when the half-remembered conversation came back to him in full. It had been Erica, back before she’d become the bane of his existence, who had told him about the new exhibit.

Slowly he turned, dreading the sight he knew awaited him. Yes. There she was, strutting around in her sunshine yellow dress as though she owned the place. Could he avoid her? She wasn’t looking at him. He could probably sneak over to the stairs and slink out the front doors of the museum.

But why should he? The thought was unexpected. Dil wasn’t usually one to be confident and assertive.Yet, standing there in the museum, when all he’d wanted was to get out of the house and distract himself from his most recent love disaster, it suddenly occurred to him that there was no reason at all why he should have to avoid Erica…or any of his former loves! He had just as much right to be there as she did. Who was she to tell him where he could and couldn’t go? (Never mind that she hadn’t actually said anything at all to him.) Well, she was no one, that’s what! She was no one at all to Dil anymore, and he had half a mind to let her know that. In fact, he was going to!

Without him quite telling them to, Dil suddenly discovered that his feet were carrying him across the room, right over to where Erica stood checking something on her cell phone.

“Fancy meeting you here,” he said loudly. She looked up, her expression changing swiftly from startled to annoyed.

“Oh, it’s you,” she said, pointedly raising her phone once again and focusing her eyes on its screen. “What do you want?”

“Nothing,” Dil said, and it felt so good to actually  _mean_  it. “Nothing at all.”

“Then what are you doing here?” She did have a point there, but Dil wasn’t about to admit that to her.

“Why do you always have to be so rude about everything?” he demanded, irked at how little she seemed to care about his words. “God, you’re the worst!”

She dropped her phone at that, training a narrow-eyed glare on him.

“Well, at least I’m not a heart-eyed little puppy who confesses his love to every girl who happens to say more than to two words to him.” She pitched her voice to carry, and a few people nearby turned away from the artwork they’d been perusing to see what the commotion was about.

“I never said I loved you!” Dil was burning white hot with anger, and he didn’t care that people were staring. “I liked you, sure, but love? Who could love a venomous harpy like you?”

He thought for a moment that he saw actual flames flash from Erica’s eyes, but surely that was just a trick of the lighting.

“That’s it, Dil Howlter,” she growled. “This means war.” And then, out of nowhere, she slugged him right in the jaw. It was all flying fists and scratching nails — and did he feel her teeth on his arm at one point? — for about thirty seconds after that. Then, just a quickly as she’d attacked, Erica backed away. Dil took the moment to escape downstairs, slipping through an open door he found and hoping that Erica wouldn’t follow. She was just pure evil, that woman.

“Dil?

He spun on his heel and was greeted with a sight that made his heart sink — Summer Holiday, positively radiant in her ensemble of short shorts and striped tube top, was standing in the middle of the small side gallery, regarding him with wide, sky-blue eyes. Great! Yet another person he was hoping never to have to see again.

“Are you all right? You look like you’ve just been in a fight!”

“Oh, ha ha. No,” he laughed and scratched the back of his head nervously. “I was just, um…looking for the bathroom?” Wow. Could he be any lamer?

“I think it’s that way,” she pointed over his shoulder, and sure enough, there behind him was the sign with the little man/woman symbols on it.

“Ah, right. Thanks.” He turned away from her and practically ran towards the sign. This confirmed it. Coming to the museum had been a huge mistake.

He stayed in the bathroom for a solid ten minutes, hoping against hope that when he emerged at last, Summer would have moved on. He nearly groaned with frustration when he caught sight of her, seated on a low bench in the center of the room, apparently waiting for him. She jumped up as soon as she saw him, and rushed over.

“Are you sure you’re okay? You were in there a long time…”

“Oh, um…bad…salad…” he mumbled, doing his best to edge away from her. Why had he ever decided to come to this gods-cursed place?

“You aren’t happy to see me, are you?”

He stopped trying to escape then and just stared at her. Being honest with Erica hadn’t turned out so great…but then again, he’d probably have ended up fighting with her no matter what they said. No, he was still feeling bold. Might as well clear the air with everyone while he was at it.

“Frankly, I’m not. The last time we met, you rejected me pretty soundly.”

“Well, yeah…” She shrugged a little and shook her head. “Look, Dil, I think you’re great. It’s just…”

He steeled himself.

“Just?”

“Well, why do you always have to try to rush into things? I mean, we were just getting to know one another, and then all of a sudden you start coming on to me, telling me my name is all wrong because I look more like an ice princess than a summer holiday. Look, I was talking to Erica, and she feels the same —“

All of the blood drained from Dil’s face.

“You were talking to Erica? About me?”

“Well, yeah, it just seemed the natural thing to do—“

“Excuse me,” Dil said, and turned tail and practically ran from the museum. Nope, nope, nope. He never should’ve gone there. No, he should’ve stuck with somewhere safe. The gym! The gym was a safe place to go. He could run on the treadmill and watch mindless tv and get so exhausted that when he got home he would just collapse into bed and fall asleep without a single thought in his head.

And this plan was going great, perfectly in fact. He even met a nice woman named Joelle who seemed to really get his goofy sense of humor. But then Joelle had to leave, and when she had gone, her treadmill was taken over by none other than the one and only Eliza Pancakes.

She didn’t seem to notice him at first. Perhaps that’s why she’d been so daft as to choose the treadmill next to his. He wondered what would be the most unobtrusive way to turn the treadmill off and leave. Of all the people he didn’t want to see today, Eliza was the one he most dreaded. He’d caved and checked his phone on the way here, only to find that she still hadn’t replied to his e-mail. Had she even read it yet? Would it be more or less awkward meeting her now if she hadn’t?

“I read your e-mail.”

The words were quiet, but they startled him so much he gave a violent start and nearly fell off his treadmill. He turned to look at her, but she was just jogging at an easy pace, staring straight ahead with a serene expression on her face.

“Oh?” he replied faintly.

“Thank you for apologizing,” she said. “It meant a lot to me…and to Bob.”

“Oh…?” he said because what else was there to say?

“Actually…Bob told me that he liked you a lot…”

“Did he?” If Dil had been watching the monitor on his treadmill screen he would have seen that his heart rate had suddenly begun to spike. Instead, he was gaping at Eliza.

“Yes. He said you were quite right about the yard. He wanted to know if you had any tips for improving it?”

“Erm, well, I’m not exactly a master gardener, but I suppose I could pass on a few points I’ve picked up…”

“Great!” And she turned a sudden, brilliant smile on him. Unobserved, the heart rate monitor started going crazy. “Can you come by, say, day after tomorrow?”

Dil blinked and then grinned.

“Yeah, sure!”

She deepened her smile, and then gave him a quick up-and-down look, taking in his entire, leathery outfit.

“Oh, and Dil?”

“Yes, Eliza?”

“You should wear that.” And then she gave him a small, coy smile and turned back to her treadmill.

TO BE CONTINUED…????

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally posted on tumblr in celebration of the five days of Dilmas.

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on tumblr to celebrate the five days of Dilmas. (Yeah, I missed a day. Oops.)


End file.
